Personality, Intelligence, Cognitive Skills, and Life Outcomes

Dear Colleagues,

The last 25 years saw an explosion in research about the role of intelligence in important life outcomes. Not that psychologists were not aware of the importance of intelligence before, but the publication of Herrnesting and Murray’s (1994) “the bell curve” drew also the attention of other social scientists, particularly economists, as well as the attention of the general public, to the role of intelligence in modern society. In the beginning, the ensuing debate, focused on the role of intelligence versus socio-economic background (see, for example, Fraser, 2008, the “the bell curve wars”), but recently the focus switched to a discussion about the relative role of intelligence versus personality. This discussion has significant implications. It has theoretical implications for our basic understanding of the human condition and the structure of society, and it has practical implications for social and economic policy.

We are looking for papers that deal with one of the following topics:

• Papers that compare the predictive validity of intelligence and personality (both broadly defined) on critical life outcomes such as occupational success, both extrinsic (e.g., pay) and intrinsic (e.g., job satisfaction, burnout), social functioning (e.g., crime, divorce, civic participation), health outcomes (e.g., health behavior, mortality), fertility, and more.
• Papers that compare the processes by which intelligence, in conjunction with personality, and possibly other variables (e.g., socio-economic background) affect important life-outcomes (e.g., mediating and moderating effects).
• Papers that investigate the reverse causality effects between personality, intelligence and important life outcomes, e.g., how life outcomes such as social status, health, job complexity, and poverty, might affect intelligence, cognitive functioning and personality?
• Theoretical papers that seek to establish novel theoretical contributions to our understanding of interrelations between intelligence, personality and important life outcomes.
• Review papers that summarize the body of existing research and provide new and original insights into the role of intelligence versus personality in important life outcomes.
• Papers that discuss how conceptualization and measurement of intelligence and personality might influence our understanding of their joint effect on important life outcomes.
• We are also open to papers that take a critical view of the role of intelligence and personality in predicting life outcomes and/or discuss other factors that can explain observed effects of intelligence and personality on important life outcomes.

Prof. Dr. Yoav Ganzach
Dr. Konrad Kulikowski
Topic Editors